County of marker: Benton County
Location of marker: Military Rd., eastern overlook stop 7, Pea Ridge National Battlefield
Marker erected by: National Park Service
Marker text: General William Y. Slack, of the Missouri State Guard, was felled by a rifle ball in the desperate fighting on the nearby wooded flanks of Pea Ridge during the morning of March 7, 1862. The Cofederate officer died of his wounds two weeks later.
"William Yarnel Slack (August 1, 1816 – March 21, 1862) was a Missouri lawyer, politician, and general in the Missouri State Guard (aligned with the Confederate States Army) during the American Civil War. He led a division in some of war's earliest major battles in the Trans-Mississippi Theater and was mortally wounded in the Battle of Pea Ridge in Arkansas
"Shortly after the start of the Civil War, pro-Confederacy factions in Missouri became organized as the Missouri State Guard, and Slack, with his previous military experience and political connections, was appointed by Governor of Missouri Claiborne F. Jackson as a brigadier general in command of the 5th Division of the MSG. His commission dated from July 4, 1861. In an August reorganization of the Guard, Slack assumed command of the 4th Division, which consisted of both cavalry and infantry. He saw action in the battles of Carthage and Springfield. He was wounded by a bullet in the left hip at the Battle of Wilson's Creek on August 10.
"By the end of October, Slack had recovered sufficiently to resume his field duties. He took command of the 2nd brigade of the Missouri State Guard on January 23, 1862. On March 7 of that year, he was shot again in the left hip during the Battle of Pea Ridge (Elkhorn Tavern) in Arkansas. He was taken to a house a mile in the rear lines, where he improved and was assumed to be recovering. Because of fears he might be captured by Union forces, he was transported seven miles eastward to a field hospital in Battle of Pea Ridge (Elkhorn Tavern) in Arkansas, where his condition rapidly deteriorated. He lingered for two weeks before dying early in the morning of March 21. He was buried in the yard, but in 1880, his remains were exhumed and reinteered in the Fayetteville Confederate Cemetery in Fayetteville, Arkansas.
"Ironically, due to communication delays between the Trans-Mississippi District and the Confederacy's War Department in distant Richmond, Virginia, his formal commission as a brigadier general in the Confederate Army was awarded posthumously dating from April 12, 1862.
His commander at Pea Ridge, Sterling Price, deemed Slack as one of "my best and bravest officers." ~ Wikipedia